Trump’s Three Arrows

From Goehring & Rozencwajg

President Trump has once again pledged that, if re-elected, he will slash the cost of energy in the USA. At the Republican National Convention, he declared his intention to spark a monumental drilling boom that would flood the market with oil and natural gas, ultimately bringing prices down to a comfortable level for all.

Should Trump win the upcoming election, we can anticipate an uptick in his rhetoric. This rhetoric will undoubtedly send strong negative signals through the investor community—a community that has already adopted a bearish outlook on global oil and gas markets. But here’s where it gets intriguing: despite the sincerity and good intentions behind Trump’s plans, our analysis suggests that the geological forces at play make this pledge more of a wish than a realistic goal.

President Trump is not the first president to put forward a national goal of significantly increasing US oil and natural gas production.